News Archive

Here you will find news items, reports, consultations and publications that will be of particular interest to LIN members, plus all the latest information from government, regulators and local authorities.

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The DWP has issued a new guide that includes a helpline for landlords who have had their Universal Credit Alternative Payment Arrangement approved and whose tenants will still not communicate with them.

Champion of accessible and inclusive housing, Habinteg is campaigning for the government, councils and developers to recognise the importance of increasing the supply of accessible homes to meet national demand.

While social media can be very successfully used to build a more direct and personal connection with tenants, housing associations and social landlords need to be prepared to respond meaningfully when things aren't going to plan

As the dust settles on the general election and politicians both in Westminster and Cardiff Bay get back to the job of government, there is a lot of uncertainty about the future direction of housing policy

The deregulatory measures in the Housing and Planning Act 2016 amend the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 by removing the requirement for private registered providers to seek the regulator's consent to the disposal of social housing and to some constitutional changes

The National Assembly for Wales is the democratically elected body that represents the interests of Wales and its people, makes laws for Wales, agrees Welsh taxes and holds the Welsh Government to account

As LHA rates are based on the number of bedrooms that a tenant and their household needs and not the size of the property occupied, work was required to establish the impact of under-occupancy on Housing Benefit

Over the next three years a number of changes will be introduced that will adversely affect housing affordability for more people living on low incomes in social and private rented accommodation, as well as social housing providers' ability to build new homes and deliver a broad range of services

The end of tenancy cleanup can often make or break the decision to hand back a deposit so spare a thought for this student whose video of the mess he was left to clean after his housemates left has gone viral

Landlords should be cautious of using family members as rent guarantors post-Brexit, urges Housing Hand, the UK's only secured and reliably insured guarantor service for students and working professionals

A disabled woman who converted a bedroom in her rented housing association property into a second living room so she could have a living space separate from her carers was still liable for the higher rate of the so-called 'bedroom tax'

The extremely tight deadlines attached to Scottish Government requests to local authorities for information on high rise stock, following last week's tragic fire in West London, may be diverting landlords from even greater priorities over fire safety

A proposed amendment to the government's Housing and Planning Bill which suggests landlords are required to make homes 'fit for human habitation' may be reconsidered following the fire at 27-storey residential block Grenfell Tower this week

A Tory peer has attacked current Conservative policy on the private rented sector and called for a new government to ditch 'ill-conceived tax hikes on private rented homes which are stifling investment

The DWP appears to have gone back on its promise to a tribunal to address a fatal flaw in its "fitness for work" test that has led to the deaths of multiple benefit claimants with mental health conditions

There is growing interest in the social housing sector in learning more about customers and properties using 'data mining' techniques applied to combinations of data held by landlords and external agencies

Westminster Council has launched an urgent investigation after a letter was sent to households in temporary accommodation telling them their possessions could be destroyed if they did not pay a weekly storage charge

The UK Residential Market Survey is used by the Government, the Bank of England and other key institutions, including the IMF, as an indicator of current and future conditions in UK residential sales and lettings

That one in four low-income households struggle to eat regularly or healthily because of food costs, and that inflation in food and fuel are about to soar, should flash a warning light to the social housing sector

With 14% of all households in Scotland now calling the private rented sector home compared with just 5% back in 1999, more people than ever are looking to the private rented sector for long-term housing solutions

Over three-quarters of landlords have no intention of expanding their property portfolios within the next year, with 10.5% saying they will be selling off properties amid concerns over impending tax changes

Letting agents in Scotland face criminal sanctions if they do not sign up to a mandatory register, laying down a marker for what could happen in England if licensing were introduced south of the border

The proportion of landlords intending to take out commercial loans to fund their property purchases has doubled over the last 18 months as they look for ways to avoid the impact of forthcoming changes to landlord taxation

A Belfast family have spoken of their outrage after receiving a letter notifying them that their housing benefit is to be cut because their family home has been designated as under-occupied under new rules

Tenants face potential rent increases of twenty to thirty per cent as a result of tax rises hitting the private rented sector says a former independent member of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee

The significant variation in the Local Housing Allowance (LHA)cap across the country means that the new system for funding supported and sheltered housing will operate very differently in different parts of the country

In her second major foray into public policy outside of Brexit - the first being an intention to found new grammar schools - Prime Minister Theresa May announced on 8th January that her Government would be committed to enabling a 'shared society'

A landlord and letting agency have together been fined more than £26,000 after being found guilty of housing offences following a multi-agency operation carried out at two properties in Luton last year

This briefing, which includes details of housebuilding schemes elsewhere in the UK, looks at the picture in early 2017 and considers whether the government is on target to build one million new homes by the end of the decade.

An app that claims to speed up finding a London home for tenants has launched a new feature for negotiators to assess potential renters for landlords and distinguish between time wasters and serious viewings

Council housing staff across Scotland have welcomed the news that the Scottish Government will use its new welfare powers to allow the housing element of Universal Credit to be paid directly to landlords

Lenders reported that demand for secured lending for house purchase increased slightly in the final three months of 2016, partly driven by landlords, but the mortgage market is expected to be flat in the first quarter of this year

A council tenant who claimed that his occupancy agreement should be treated as a Scottish secure tenancy because it did not contain an express provision stating that it was for a term of less than six months

As if our industry had not already been in trouble enough, the Government has blasted us with both barrels between the eyes by introducing a ban on lettings agents' tenant fees within the Autumn Statement

When the government announced plans to cut £4bn of in-work social security in its summer budget last year, it was widely condemned by commentators and organisations for hitting some of the poorest working families hardest

A majority of tenants and housing associations to respond to a consultation believe the quality of social landlord services has improved since the Scottish Government introduced a social housing charter

The idea of poverty and the meaning of the term in the UK is contested, and those working to tackle poverty are finding it difficult to shift negative public attitudes and cultivate broad public support for policies to solve it

The government is extending mandatory licensing for houses in multiple occupation so 870,000 additional private tenants have extra protection from rogue landlords, including through minimum space standards

The consultation seeks views and evidence in relation to the detailed design and implementation of the exceptions to the policy to limit the Individual Child Element of Child Tax Credit and the Child Element of Universal Credit to a maximum of two children

In this new article for EYE, I am warning that a new Immigration Act upgrade is to come into force before the end of this year, with serious legal implications for both letting agents and private landlords

The Residential Landlords Association is warning that a landmark case of a tenant using the Human Rights Act to avoid eviction could make it harder to enforce Section 21 notices if the tenant wins her case at the European Court of Human Rights

For the first time, an authoritative statutory body has recognised that the cuts to Universal Credit announced in last summer's Budget will mean that it is much less generous than was originally planned

Landlords are licking their wounds after a Judge yesterday ruled against a Judicial Review of former Chancellor George Osborne's capping of the amount of mortgage interest that they can offset against tax

Legal represenatives for two landlords will today make the case for a judicial review of Section 24 of the Finance (No.2) Act 2015 - a bid to stop the phased reduction of mortgage interest tax relief for landlords, sscheduled to be introduced from next April

This aims to give guidance to housing associations on how 'right to rent' document checks affect their procedures, such as their allocations and lettings policies, their policies on lodgers and their procedures for verifying tenancies.